[This is the twenty-third in a series that will probably be VERY intermittent, if I remember to post at all. I've long known that while I have given my share of 10-out-of-10 ratings for movies over the years, in almost every case, those movies are fairly old. So I got this idea to go back and revisit movies of relatively recent vintage that I gave a rating of 9, to see if time and perspective convinced me to bump that rating up to 10.]
Director Ramin Bahrani works with supreme confidence ... any misgivings that might arise as you watch are, well, they don't arise because you're sucked in to the matter-of-fact presentation of a segment of American life invisible to most of us. Perhaps afterwards you wonder about the plot (or lack of same), or how much the realist style matches the reality of what is being shown. But this is a remarkable film that reminds one of any number of genres, none of which seem to be American (Italian neo-realism is one clear influence).
I agree with everything I said at the time. I'm still not convinced this is a "10". Roger Ebert once wrote that with Chop Shop "we have an American film with the raw power of 'City of God'". It's splitting hairs, I suppose, but City of God is the kind of great movie that elicits a "10" from me as soon I see it ... it came out in 2002, and it never made a list of "9s". Maybe it's the lack of sensationalism, but in the end, Chop Shop doesn't jump off the screen the way City of God does. Chop Shop is a wonderful movie, but it's not quite a classic.
[This is the twenty-second in a series that will probably be VERY intermittent, if I remember to post at all. I've long known that while I have given my share of 10-out-of-10 ratings for movies over the years, in almost every case, those movies are fairly old. So I got this idea to go back and revisit movies of relatively recent vintage that I gave a rating of 9, to see if time and perspective convinced me to bump that rating up to 10.]
As the film moseyed along, I felt that rather than create tension, Tarantino was just relying on our knowledge of Manson, Tate, et al to give unearned suspense to his movie. As Mick LaSalle wrote, "It’s amazingly discursive. Tarantino knows he has our attention, because he knows that we know where the movie is heading, toward that fateful night in Bel Air. He also knows we’re not exactly in a hurry to get there." But the tension is real in the last part of the movie, partly because "we know where the movie is heading", yes, but also because Tarantino takes us there. And, of course, we don't necessarily know where it's heading, we just think we do.
I think I got this right back in 2020. Like all Tarantino movies, it has scenes that dazzle. Like all Tarantino movies, it has dialogue that sparkles. Like all Tarantino movies, it has an intricate plot that seems as if it will never come together, only then it does. And like all Tarantino movies, there's excess, which often seems like the point, and it's often the best part of his movies, but not always ... sometimes he misses. So, to reference the "is it a 9 or a 10" question, Quentin Tarantino may be the ultimate "9" director who could make a "10" only then it wouldn't be a Tarantino movie.
So he has a scene with an actor playing Bruce Lee, and it's a good performance by Mike Moh, and Tarantino gives him and Brad Pitt some fun dialogue. And the scene is satisfying for the viewer. But it's also so insulting to the legend of Bruce Lee that China wouldn't allow the film's release unless Quentin removed the scene (he refused). Lee's daughter found the scene offensive ... so did Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Tarantino says the daughter had the right to be offended, but no one else. Stop, they're all right ... well, China's ful of it, but Tarantino was right to make fun of Bruce Lee's image, and Lee's family and friends were right to defend Bruce's honor. The result is a fun scene that nonetheless leaves a sour taste, and that kind of thing turns up every once in a while in a Quentin Tarantino film, meaning his movies become "9s" rather than "10s".
I also noted in my earlier review that Tarantino put together a great cast for OUATIH, and five years later, it looks even better. Austin Butler was an up-and-comer ... in his next movie, he got an Oscar nomination for playing Elvis. Then, Mikey Madison was one of the girls in Better Things ... now she's getting Oscar talk for Anora. Then, Sydney Sweeney was little known, with her breakout role on Euphoria a couple of months away. Now she's in half of the movies that are released and she's the new It Girl.
The movie is on all sorts of lists, including #86 on the They Shoot Pictures, Don't They list of the top 1000 films of the 21st century (#845 on the All-Time list).
[This is the twenty-first in a series that will probably be VERY intermittent, if I remember to post at all. I've long known that while I have given my share of 10-out-of-10 ratings for movies over the years, in almost every case, those movies are fairly old. So I got this idea to go back and revisit movies of relatively recent vintage that I gave a rating of 9, to see if time and perspective convinced me to bump that rating up to 10.]
"I'm not sure I can even reduce Parasite to a specific genre, which may be a sign that I liked it even more than the others.... Parasite starts off as one kind of movie, almost a comedy, gradually and almost unnoticed takes a turn into another kind of movie, reflects on the notion of parasites, and somehow at the end you realize it was never just one kind of movie, but always all kinds of movies. It is constantly surprising."
If anything, I was more locked in than ever to the class warfare angle. This really is a great movie, deserving of all its many awards (Best Picture Oscar, #242 on the They Shoot Pictures, Don't They list of the top 1000 films of all time, #11 for 21st-century pictures). It is the perfect example of my tendencies to hesitate over the greatness of newer movies ... I have no idea why I didn't give this my highest rating the first time I saw it.
This wasn't an exact revisit, though, for on this second viewing, I decided to watch Director Bong's black-and-white version. Honestly, it quickly became normal, and I didn't spend much time thinking about how it looked it color. It was still great.
And here is one of Bong's memorable acceptance speeches at the Oscars:
[This is the twentieth in a series that will probably be VERY intermittent, if I remember to post at all. I've long known that while I have given my share of 10-out-of-10 ratings for movies over the years, in almost every case, those movies are fairly old. So I got this idea to go back and revisit movies of relatively recent vintage that I gave a rating of 9, to see if time and perspective convinced me to bump that rating up to 10.]
I think it’s the best fiction film I’ve seen from 2010, and I thought Jennifer Lawrence should have won the Best Actress Oscar over Natalie Portman for Black Swan. Lawrence was a revelation when I first saw the film. I knew nothing about her. Things have changed in just two years: as the star of The Hunger Games, Lawrence is poised to become one of the top stars of her day, and she’s only 21 years old. Thankfully, she doesn’t seem to have reached such a pinnacle at an early age for the usual reasons (great-looking, panders to young males), but because she is giving excellent performances. It doesn’t hurt that she’s great-looking, of course, but Winter’s Bone buries her traditional good looks in grit and mounds of cold-weather gear, allowing her to be a special kind of beautiful, strong and centered. Perhaps Portman gives us a peek at what Lawrence might have in store: three movies in the Star Wars franchise, lots of indie films, the lead role in an action picture, and ultimately an Oscar.
It's interesting to look back after watching Lawrence's career over the past decade-plus. She did indeed end up in franchise films, playing Mystique in X-Men movies four times, and, of course, starring as Katniss Everdeen in four Hunger Games movies. In 2015 and 2016 she was the highest-paid actress in the world. But she has also featured in non-franchise films, including some indie projects (she formed her own production company ... the first release was the fine Causeway starring Lawrence and Brian Tyree Henry). She has been nominated for four Oscars, winning Best Actress for Silver Linings Playbook. It's a very successful career, and she's still only 33.
But what about "The 9s"? Did I underrate Winter's Bone because it was too new? I've seen it at least three times now ... clearly I like it. I taught it in tandem with the novel on which it was based when I was teaching. Perhaps most important for this purpose, in 2021, for a user poll at They Shoot Pictures, Don't They, I listed Winter's Bone among the 25 best movies of all time. 5, 945 films received votes ... I was the only person who voted for Winter's Bone. I have it at #7 on my list of the top films of the 2010s.
So yeah, I think it's time to give it the cherished 10/10.
[This is the nineteenth in a series that will probably be VERY intermittent, if I remember to post at all. I've long known that while I have given my share of 10-out-of-10 ratings for movies over the years, in almost every case, those movies are fairly old. So I got this idea to go back and revisit movies of relatively recent vintage that I gave a rating of 9, to see if time and perspective convinced me to bump that rating up to 10.]
In 2008, I wrote about Red Cliff, "John Woo returns to China, makes two-part historical epic, regains his Mojo. I haven't had time to really think about this movie yet ... what it 'means.' But it's a marvelous thing to watch, with some fascinating battle scenes." More to the point, I wrote the following about Red Cliff II the next year:
There are two essential items going on here, the strategy preparing for battle, and the battle itself (as I recall, it was much the same in Part One). I’m not a fan of “war strategy” movies, but this stuff is fascinating. It takes place in the early 3rd century, so the weapons aren’t very advanced. But they are put to ingenious uses, and the overall strategies on both sides are interesting mostly because of the point/counterpoint feel. The leaders on both sides know how war is “supposed” to be fought, and there’s a bit of game theory going on, as first one side and then another attempts to figure out how the other will vary from the norm, so that they can themselves vary in a useful manner. The result would please the A-Team’s Hannibal … as you watch in admiration, you think “I love it when a plan comes together.” The final battle sequence is as good as any you’ve seen. The only problem is that we’re getting aesthetic pleasure from the deaths of tens of thousands of people, and while there are brief moments when we’re reminded of the deceased, for the most part our reaction is more “Wow!” than “poor fellow.” This was true in Woo’s HK action films, of course, but the scale here is far beyond that of a movie like Hard Boiled. Still, watching Woo put all the pieces together in such a way that the audience can clearly follow the action mirrors the way the warlords put the pieces of their plans together.
I did indeed rate Red Cliff 9/10, which is why it's in this series. I gave the second film a 10/10, and I'm not sure why I thought it was the better of the two films ... they are equals. In fact, in some ways they are exactly equals: in America, the films were combined into a shorter version (also called Red Cliff), and I'm pretty sure Woo thought of them as two parts of the same movie. I have never seen the shorter version. This time around, I was taken by the acting. I've seen Tony Leung in 12 movies ... I've never given one of his pictures less than 7/10, and I've given my top 10/10 rating to four of them. Chow Yun-Fat was the HK actor who first got my attention, but over the years, I think Tony Leung Chiu-wai may have overtaken him. Heck, he might be my favorite actor of all time from any country. (I re-watched both movies back-to-back over the past two days.)
[This is the eighteenth in a series that will probably be VERY intermittent, if I remember to post at all. I've long known that while I have given my share of 10-out-of-10 ratings for movies over the years, in almost every case, those movies are fairly old. So I got this idea to go back and revisit movies of relatively recent vintage that I gave a rating of 9, to see if time and perspective convinced me to bump that rating up to 10.]
George Clooney has crafted a concise account of a specific moment in time, kept the attention of the audience while dealing with material that could easily have been drab, made several important decisions as a director that greatly enhance the movie (the black and white look, the apparent accuracy of the depiction of newsrooms in the 50s, getting David Strathairn to play Ed Murrow), and brought it all home in less than 100 minutes. The focus of the film is remarkable, in subject matter (it's not about the entire career of Murrow, or of McCarthy for that matter, but only about the period when they crossed swords) and in settings (most of the film takes place in cramped quarters inside a news studio).
And Clooney's underlying argument, that today's press doesn't do its job, that today's Joe McCarthys are not called on their lunacy, that in fact today's Joe McCarthys are as often as not members of the media themselves, is a good one.
And yet (and how many films are there where I don't ever say "and yet"?) ... the precision, the conciseness, the focus, means that the film's vision of Edward R. Murrow is too narrow. There's too much hero worshiping, and Murrow's career was more complicated than what we see in this film. This makes the movie, in retrospect, seem a bit untrustworthy.
And while Clooney mostly makes smart moves as a director, his decision to include musical interludes is a bad one. The interludes are fine in and of themselves, and they might even work in a more surreal film. But here, with Clooney striving for the maximum in authenticity, it's just odd and confusing to see Dianne Reeves singing sultry tunes somewhere in the CBS studios.
The movie is nominated for six Oscars, and they are a mixed bunch. Best Picture? Possibly. Best Director? Also possible. Best Actor? Why not? Best Cinematography and Art Direction? It really shines in these areas, even if I'm not quite sure what "art direction" means. Best Screenplay? Here, I'd have to disagree ... much of the best dialogue in the film is taken directly from transcripts from Murrow's television shows, and I can't see honoring such a process with a Best Screenplay award (maybe if it was in the "previously published" section instead of the "written directly for the screen" section).
I don't have a lot to add, except that I think I was a bit hard on the film, meaning if it had come out in the 1950s, I would have already given it a 10. I complained about the music interludes, but this time, they seemed right. I still think Best Screenplay is a bit of a stretch, except everything in the film, real footage and speeches and "acted" material, is blended perfectly. Good Night, and Good Luck is an exceptional film.
[This is the seventeenth in a series that will probably be VERY intermittent, if I remember to post at all. I've long known that while I have given my share of 10-out-of-10 ratings for movies over the years, in almost every case, those movies are fairly old. So I got this idea to go back and revisit movies of relatively recent vintage that I gave a rating of 9, to see if time and perspective convinced me to bump that rating up to 10.]
The violence, implied and actual, remains excruciating... it’s not cool at all … I’d call it gruesome and funny, which I understand is an odd combination. Oldboy’s narrative grabs the viewer from the start and never lets up. And the themes, of love and taboos, and the allusions, to Kafka and Memento, make Oldboy into a full experience.
I agree with the above. A second viewing made me feel like it was funnier than I remembered, and the gruesome scenes, while outrageous, do take place mostly just off the screen. The plot unfolds in a gradual fashion, with the key revelations being spaced apart just the right amount. Oldboy remains my favorite Park movie, but I still think it falls just short of classic status.
[This is the sixteenth in a series that will probably be VERY intermittent, if I remember to post at all. I've long known that while I have given my share of 10-out-of-10 ratings for movies over the years, in almost every case, those movies are fairly old. So I got this idea to go back and revisit movies of relatively recent vintage that I gave a rating of 9, to see if time and perspective convinced me to bump that rating up to 10. Of course, it's always possible I'll drop the rating, but time will tell.]
I first saw The Exonerated in 2005. This is where I usually paste something from my original review, but I never actually wrote about the movie until now. It's a TV movie of a different type, at least for me, at least in 2005: it comes from Court TV, rather than the usual HBO or Netflix (well, Netflix wasn't the Netflix we know today, yet).
It's easy to see why I was so high on the movie when I saw it that first time. It's well-written by Jessica Blank and Erik Jensen, from their play. The presentation is spare but effective. And the stories are gripping. We meet six people who were sentenced to death row for crimes they did not commit. The words that we hear are from actual transcripts and interviews, and the actors chosen to portray the six are exemplary (Brian Dennehy, Danny Glover, Delroy Lindo, Aidan Quinn, and Susan Sarandon, as well as new-to-me David Brown, Jr.).
Yet I feel like I understand why I didn't go all the way to the top with my rating. There's nothing wrong with being "stage-bound" ... A Streetcar Named Desire is one of my favorite movies. But we're always aware of the theater source of The Exonerated, and that distracted me. Also, we believe the stories we are hearing, and for the most part, it seems Blank and Jensen got it right, but one of the six apparently turned out to be guilty after all, which casts doubt on the entire production. Which isn't fair, but there you are.
So I still think The Exonerated is a fine film, but it's closer to an 8 than it is to a 10.
[This is the fifteenth in a series that will probably be VERY intermittent, if I remember to post at all. I've long known that while I have given my share of 10-out-of-10 ratings for movies over the years, in almost every case, those movies are fairly old. So I got this idea to go back and revisit movies of relatively recent vintage that I gave a rating of 9, to see if time and perspective convinced me to bump that rating up to 10. Of course, it's always possible I'll drop the rating, but time will tell.]
I first saw Portrait of a Lady on Fire in 2020. At that time, I wrote, comparing it to Blue Is the Warmest Color:
The films do make for instructive examples of the differences between the male and female gaze. And "gaze" is the proper term for Portrait of a Lady on Fire, for much of the relationship between the two women is shown in how they look at each other. Noémie Merlant and Adèle Haenel as a painter and her reluctant subject are perfectly matched, and both deliver perfect performances.
A second viewing only emphasized how intensely Sciamma and her actors convey so much desire just by looking at each other. Merlant's eyes in particular are dark and deep ... you could fall into them and never return.
I also quoted Mick LaSalle, who wrote, "The last time I wanted two people to kiss this much, I was one of the people."
We watched with friends who hadn't seen it before, and one of them said you always knew they were going to kiss. Yes, I said, but it's like Hitchcock saying that "suspense is when the spectator knows more than the characters in the movie." In his example, the audience knows there's a bomb under the table, and it is suspenseful because we know it will go off, but the characters are clueless to this eventuality. In Portrait of a Lady on Fire, the audience knows the women will kiss, but Sciamma draws out the exquisite expectation of that kiss, such that you start to wonder if maybe you were wrong. Spoiler alert: they kiss.
Is it "really" a 10 and not a 9? Probably ... if it was made in the 1960s, I wouldn't have feared rating it too highly because of its newness. Having seen only two of her movies (the other being Petite Maman), I am prepared to accept that Céline Sciamma is one of our finest film makers.
[This is the fourteenth in a series that will probably be VERY intermittent, if I remember to post at all. I've long known that while I have given my share of 10-out-of-10 ratings for movies over the years, in almost every case, those movies are fairly old. So I got this idea to go back and revisit movies of relatively recent vintage that I gave a rating of 9, to see if time and perspective convinced me to bump that rating up to 10. Of course, it's always possible I'll drop the rating, but time will tell.]
I first saw No End in Sight in late 2007. At that time, I wrote:
A common thread emerges from all of these witnesses ... Whatever your thoughts on the morality or political efficacy of the war, we might have pulled it off. But the people in charge were arrogant pricks who refused to listen to expert advice because they knew what they wanted to do, and they did it.
Bush is attacked primarily as the hands-off President who let things happen on his watch. The ones who construct the failed scenario (Cheney, Rumsfeld, and later Paul Bremer, to mention three of a very small number) apparently didn't do a single thing right. So whatever "success" might have been possible was never going to happen, thanks to the colossal incompetence of the men (and Condi Rice) in charge.
The film's own success comes by presenting material you think you know from a slightly different angle, which allows you to see things afresh. This is not an anti-war film, or perhaps even an anti-Iraq War film. It is a film that unsparingly documents the endless series of boneheaded decisions that have left Iraq in a state of chaos. It is not a pretty picture, or a pretty film.
Judging (or rather, re-judging) a documentary is affected not just by the artistic work itself, but also by how the situation depicted in the movie might have changed in the ensuing years. The American presence in Iraq has been reduced enough that President Biden was able to announce the end of the combat mission in Iraq (in 2021!) without sounding too evasive. But the main thing you take away from the film isn't anything specific about Iraq policy. Instead, Charles Ferguson shows how incompetent the U.S. was, and nothing I've seen since then makes me think he was wrong in his assessment. (Also, that their incompetence didn't rise from innate stupidity, but more from innate arrogance.) Most of the leaders are still with us (Donald Rumsfeld died a couple of years ago). Perhaps the most interesting continuing story from the film is that of Seth Moulton, a Marine who was one of three U.S. veterans of the war who are interviewed extensively. Moulton entered politics, becoming a member of the House of Representatives in 2015, where he still serves.
I think the film not only holds up, but makes me wonder why I hedged on the ultimate 10/10 rating. That's what it deserves, and probably deserved then, as well. No End in Sight was nominated for an Oscar ... Ferguson's next film, Inside Job, won the Oscar. If this series lasts long enough, I'll eventually re-evaluate Inside Job, too.